Submit Blog Posts to News Websites

www.scoop.co.nz, a top online news website (if you search for New Zealand news stories on Google, Scoop is listed number 1) has a new community-driven news and information website called Scoopit (see www.scoopit.co.nz). This the New Zealand equivalent of Digg and Reddit.

On Scoopit, anyone can submit stories and articles (with the link from the blog/website they came from) for review, however, rather than allowing an editor to decide which stories are worthy of frontpage attention, the users do. Once an article has at least 4 votes, it is published on the Scoopit site and the Scoop site for Google and the rest of the world to discover.

As kiwis can subscribe to Scoop to receive daily email news under any number of categories they choose, this has amazing potential for getting your news and your blog/website in front of thousands of potential customers.

How to Get Your News onto Scoopit

1. You can add a Scoopit link to all the posts on your blog which readers can click on to automatically submit your article. See an example of this at the bottom of this and every other post on my blog. Get instructions for a hosted Wordpress blog, free Wordpress blog…
2. You can add Scoopit links to your website for the same effect. Get instructions… (there is also Scoopit code to paste onto your standard webpages.)
3. You can submit articles yourself.

Once an article has been posted on Scoopit, it goes into the Pending Scoops category. You can just leave it and wait for people to Scoopit (vote for it) or email your customers/friends and ask them to vote for it. You do have to register to be able to submit articles.

Other Places to Submit Your New Zealand News/Articles/Press Releases

• www.homebizbuzz.co.nz – Share your expertise with other businesses and profile your business at the same time.
• www.newsroom.co.nz – email your press releases to editor@newsroom.co.nz for free
• www.scoop.co.nz – email Comments, articles, speeches and press releases to: editor@scoop.co.nz
• www.tv3.co.nz – You can send your stories, comments and pictures to tv3. If you have taken a picture or filmed some video that tells a story you can send that too.

If you’re aiming more at the international market, you should try Digg and Reddit.

Let me know how you go with Scoopit and others suggested above. It would be great to hear what sort of traffic you created for your site. Please feel free to Scoopit any of my articles by clicking on the Scoopit link below each post on this website.

NZ Affiliate Programs for Your Website

Joining a website affiliate program which complements your product and provides you with additional income is great for you and your customers.

Most people just add a product here and there on their website or blog, but many people are now building entire websites based on products from affiliate programs they are a member of. You simply find a niche on the web which doesn’t seem to be catered for or find a topic you are very knowledgeable/interested in, create a website, add products from various related affiliate programs, market the site well online and start earning commission on products people click on on your website. In most cases they need to actually make a purchase before you receive any money.

You can find a full list of Affiliate Programs in New Zealand at http://www.affiliateprograms.co.nz/new-zealand-affiliate-program-list/ as well as lots of useful articles on making money this way.

Or check out the Affiliate Directory, New Zealand

If you want a bit of background reading, buy Make a Fortune Promoting Other People’s Stuff Online: How Affiliate Marketing Can Make You Rich from Fishpond or buy Make a Fortune Promoting Other People’s Stuff Online from Amazon. This is the definitive guide to planning and managing a successful online affiliate business!

Wordpress Auction Website

[Read more]

Sell Books on Your Website

A great way to offer your customers additional infomation and make some money at the same time is to join a website affiliate program with Amazon (US-based) or Fishpond (New Zealand and Australia) to promote books of your choosing on your website or blog. See the Blogging Books section on the right sidebar of this blog as an example of what you can do.

Sell Amazon Books – Earn up to 8% from referrals

To join Amazon Associates, go to the Amazon website and click on Associates Program on the left sidebar. Once your membership has been approved, you login and go to Build Widgets/Links. Before you start building links or widgets, it is a good idea to visit the main website and find all the books you want to promote on your site, scroll down each book listing to find the ASBN number and make a note of it. Once you have created a widget or link, it is just a matter of pasting the code into your website or blog. The great thing about Amazon is that it is not only books, but also music, toys, clothing and millions of other products which may complement your products.

Find out more about getting your own Amazon aStore…

Types of links

1. You can create a box similar to the one on my website using the “My Favourites” link.
2. You can choose a banner link like the one below.
   
3. If you have a free Wordpress blog, you can create product links to individual books and paste them inside posts or pages for users to click on.
4. You can also build your own A-Store full of all your favourite books etc.
5. See other examples of Amazon widgets and banners in the sidebars of Kath’s Sticky Websites blog.

Sell Fishpond Books – 10% commission on books, music and movies

To join the Fishpond Affiliate Program go to http://www.fishpond.co.nz/affiliate_info.php?osCsid=cb24edb2cdd74d8586607794311c2471. Fishpond is based in New Zealand and Australia so if your customers are mostly in New Zealand, this is a good one to use in terms of delivery costs and range of New Zealand books. Once your membership has been approved, you login on left side of the website and go to Build Links. Before you start you need to visit the main Fishpond website and find all the books you want to promote on your site. You then make a note of the product number (the 7 digit number at the end of the page url) of each book. Once you have built a link, you simply paste the code into your website or blog.

Types of Links

1. Build a Link- You create links with a photo of the book to paste into a post or page on your website.
2. Product Links – You can put general banners onto your site like the one below.

All links contain your unique affiliate code so Amazon or Fishpond know that visitors have come from your website. Give it a try and add value to your website and your business.

I’ll be posting links to more great affiliate websites over the next few weeks. Please let me know how you get on with Amazon or Fishpond in the comments box below.

Add a Table of Contents to Your Blog

My all time favourite plugin which was actually discovered by a colleague, Kath from Sticky Websites… is the Site Map Plugin by Dagon Design. This plugin creates a table of contents showing all your posts under the relevant category. You download and activate the plugin, create a new page, paste in a snippet of code and you’re a step closer to making sure your blog visitors can actually find what they are looking for.

• You can see the Site Map Plugin in action at www.business-website-advice.com
• Download the Site Map Plugin

How to Use this Plugin

1. Download Plugin
2. Activate on the Plugin Administration Panel
3. Create a new page called sitemap of something similar
4. Paste the following into the code of this page. <!– ddsitemapgen –>
5. Publish your page.

More great plugins coming soon…

Personal Video Messages

A friend of my sons’ who lives in Australia recently had a birthday and we were trying to think of something really special to do for her. We recorded the boys singing Happy Birthday to her on my digital camera, complete with Hip Hip Hooray and 3 claps (for her age), uploaded it to my VodPod video clips and emailed her the link to my blog so she could watch it on her birthday. You can see the clip on my Mum2Boys blog.

Obviously not everyone wants this type of message, but doesn’t it make you think about a great personal message you could have on your website and blog for your customers to view. Let me know about your interesting video ideas using the comments form below.